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FPSC Classic Product Chat / [LOCKED] Discussing the shooting "feel" of FPSC

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Claws
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Posted: 6th Apr 2009 05:44
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Hello guys,

Well, i don't want to be a pain in the ass, like some dudes with the subject i'm about to discuss usually are, but i believe it's an inevitable subject to discuss, since we are all indie developers using the same tool. Anyway, let's go to the point.

FPSC is an amazing tool. Even with all the annoying bugs, it's an amazing engine, and the best part, allows game and level designers to focus on what they do best: design. Of course, there is a lot to be implemented, but it's already awesome right now. The only problem, and it is a major problem, is the gameplay "feel".

The FPSC graphics are great. The engine is great. For the developers, it's also great. EAI's weapons and all the models packs really make FPSC amazing. But, i don't know if you guys agree with me on this, gameplay sucks. It's not fluid. It's not really fun. From the moment you start shooting with the gorgeous EAI's weapons, you feel that something is wrong. Killing characters is also... well. Not fun at all. The shooting part of FPSC is the major problem, in my opinion.

I thought that this could be addressed easily, but i noticed the same problem on FPSCX10. There's something missing, and something pretty important, in FPSC way of handling combat. Honestly, i prefer shooting guns in Half-Life 1, which is a pretty old game, than shooting guns in FPSC games. This is also a major proof that graphics doesn't matter. I believe that Lee and the guys should focus on gameplay improvement, rather than having eye-candy stuff added during the migration. The FPSCX9 graphics engine is amazing, and the only work needed is fixing a few bugs.

Anyway, i'm not here to criticize, i'm here to discuss. I want to know if you guys feel the same way that i do, and obviously, discuss ideas to improve the gameplay ourselves. Maybe the problem is in the AI, or in the animations of enemies... i don't know. Let's discuss and share experiments.
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xplosys
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Posted: 6th Apr 2009 05:53
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Quote: "But, i don't know if you guys agree with me on this, gameplay sucks."


I don't think that's something they can supply you with. Rather it's the part that you have to add to what they already did. Perhaps I'm not understanding what you mean. What's is it about the shooting you don't like?

As for combat, that typically has to be scripted. The scripts that come with FPSC are very basic, and are there to keep the promise. (You can make a game with no coding) They leave much to be desired.

Could you expound on "game play improvements" and perhaps give an example?

Best.

fpsFREE - Contact Me
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Claws
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Posted: 6th Apr 2009 06:08
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Well, it's a hard thing to explain. That's why i wrote a big text, and probably, most people won't "get" what i meant. Let's use a few examples.

Create a simple 4x4 room in FPSC. Empty. With one starting weapon. Start shooting around. Now, place an enemy and shoot him. It's not... fun at all. Do the same thing in Half-Life 1, that has a similar combat system to FPSC. It's much more fun to shoot weapons and kill guys in HL1.

I believe that this is a sum of a large group of little things that produce this effect on the shooting feel. Your enemies backup when you shoot them, they slide instead of walking, there's no gun recoil, no bullet tracers. I don't know. Maybe i'm just being picky or a little gay about it.
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Bugsy
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Posted: 6th Apr 2009 06:23
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I think it's because of the amount of health you give your guy, and how smart you make the enemies.

1. why not give your own character the same amount of health as your enemies? just put tons of health packs

2.what main and shoot scripts do you use? try main: cover shoot: chase
or: main cautious, shoot cover. that makes them smarter and better combatants.

3. I think that the enemies are WAAAY too accurate. is their ANY way to stop them from being such deadshots. if so, tell me! it makes the game seem unrealistic and boring when the main guy can tank literally hundreds of rounds in a row. they should put an accuracy adjuster for the enemies too.

try all these things and then see if it isn't funner
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Bendak11
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Posted: 6th Apr 2009 06:25
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With Ply's you get recoil, and there was someone who created a tracer round in models and media.
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gorba flamingo
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Posted: 6th Apr 2009 08:11
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imo
even with all the things such as mode packs and graphics and yata yata blah blah blah you STILL need to put in the time and effort to make your own 100% original media and scripts to make your game... fresh and original. theres always one thing that makes a game rock, somthing trademark, somthing NO OTHER game has. halo has the sowrd and its millions of victims, GOW has the chainsaw weapon ) and more!

[url=http://profile.mygamercard.net/gorbafletch]
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Jingle Fett
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Posted: 6th Apr 2009 08:27
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I get what you're trying to say Claws, I have actually thought the exact same thing. I realized it while playing HL2...for example, using the pistol in HL2 = fun. Using a pistol in FPSC/X10 - not as fun.

I think the problem (at least with the pistol) is the balancing combined with all the little details. I think the reason the HL2 pistol is so much fun to use is because it does a lot of damage but not too much, it's just right. And then, the sound effects are good and the animations are good and the results when you shoot an enemy are good and satisfying. It's really hard to get that balance...The thing is, in FPSC/X10, those balancing tweaks aren't stock, you have to do them yourself every time.

I also agree with gorba also--when your gameplay is limited as it is with FPSC, the only way a game can shine is with lots of custom media...which is a principle I'm applying in X10. I don't use any media unless it's stock or my own.

A picture says a thousand words.
--H.K.--
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Claws
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Posted: 6th Apr 2009 09:07 Edited at: 6th Apr 2009 09:10
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Maybe you got exactly what i'm trying to say, Jingle Fett. And i'm not even comparing with HL2, i'm comparing with HL1, which is outdated, has terrible graphics when compared with FPSC, but... it's much more fun. I'm working with games that make no use of weapons right now, just because of this major "problem" of FPSC.

I won't get discouraged, though. I'll mess around with scripts and try to reproduce, even if i don't know exactly what it is, this "shooting fun" effect that the most simple FPS engines should feature.

ps.: I don't know if you guys ever played Assault Cube, Cube 2, Nexuiz and other games. They suck in the very same way FPSC does: shooting gameplay. Which is sad, because there are a lot of great games, like Combat Arms, True Combat Elite, Counter Strike (the original one), that are simply fun to shoot like a crazy. Oh, also, an example of an commercial game that has the same lame shooting system is Battlefield 2. It's terrible. However, by installing Project Reality, the shooting got extremely fun. I don't know exactly what they changed, but the game was extremely better.

ps2.: I have no problems with the way enemies act or react. Really. Ai can be programmed to my taste with the scripts. However, what really bothers me, is the way they get shot. And the way they die. I'm not talking about the need of ragdolls. We didn't had them a few years ago.
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CoffeeGrunt
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Posted: 6th Apr 2009 10:28
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With almost any mod you get Airmod, which has recoil and such. Ply's Mod has a huge repertoire of scripting additions, it only takes a little imagination to add a feature that stands out from the pack...

"Give a man a fish, and he'll eat for a day. Give a man a fishing rod, and he'll break it up into firewood...or swap it for a fish."
-Frankie Boyle, on Mock the Week
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Paul112
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Posted: 6th Apr 2009 10:28
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I get what you are saying. I think the main issues with FPSC shooting are the lack of recoil and the "false" accuracy.

Recoil would improve the enjoyment of shooting. As things currently stand, you can aim your mouse at something, and click or hold to fire at exactly the same spot. There's no need for control after you've found the initial target. What we need is the recoil to push the camera around and make us lose our target. For example, shooting a submachine gun in most games causes the camera (and crosshair) to be pushed up, so continuous effort from the player is needed to train the gun on the enemy. I've never used Ply's mod, but maybe the recoil in that works similarly.

Secondly, by "false" accuracy, I'm refering to the way FPSC handles the accuracy in a cheap sort of way. In most games, the bullets spread in a cone shape from the tip of the gun, but FPSC offsets the bullets right at the start based on how accurate the gun is supposed to be. This is why when you have an inaccurate gun, and stand with the gun barrel touching a wall, you still end up with bulletholes 6 feet away.

I don't think it's anything to do with the AI, just the way the guns work and react to shooting.

Paul

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CoffeeGrunt
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Posted: 6th Apr 2009 10:32
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Airmod also has conical accuracy that Ply improved slightly, I forgot to mention that...

"Give a man a fish, and he'll eat for a day. Give a man a fishing rod, and he'll break it up into firewood...or swap it for a fish."
-Frankie Boyle, on Mock the Week
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Errant AI
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Posted: 6th Apr 2009 11:12 Edited at: 6th Apr 2009 11:19
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Quote: "3. I think that the enemies are WAAAY too accurate. is their ANY way to stop them from being such deadshots. if so, tell me! it makes the game seem unrealistic and boring when the main guy can tank literally hundreds of rounds in a row. they should put an accuracy adjuster for the enemies too. "


AI assigned weapons shoot in a MUCH tighter pattern than the same weapon assigned to the player (inaccuracy spread about 10% of the player). So, to make the AI shoot poorly you need to give them an NPC only weapon with an accuracy of maybe 200 or so. However, that means you can't have them drop a weapon for the player to use because it would be unusable but you could script ammo to spawn or something for the player to pick up.

@Claws and everyone...

For now, if you have problems with the gunplay feel, you really MUST use any of the AirMod 0.6+ spec. FPSC Mods available (Ply's, S4, etc.) Believe me when I tell you the fun factor difference is night and day! Ply's mod is probably the best because of the tweaked conical accuracy. This allows you to have a ragged-one-hole grouping up close and proper spread at distance (perfect for shotguns).

The recoil and gunlag/lazy gun also do tremendous amounts for the feel. Also it it great to have the gun lower a little bit when running and the move animation speed change according to player speed. In fact I HATE the feel when testing my media in stock FPSC because it is so wooden. Now, add iron sights and it feels even better. I won't even go into how awesome Ply's Mod asymmetric dual-wield can be. Variable ROF was a big AirMod feature, IMO but that has since been added to stock FPSC as well as Airslide's shotgun reload code.

I feel the majority of your needs have been addressed if you are willing to use a mod. You are on your own though for better sound effects if you want them. There are loads of great resources on the net for those and many which you can use in your game but I can not use for media packs because of how the licensing works. Tracer's really are not going to happen without source modification so I think that's off-limits for now.

A good way to measure the multiple improvements AirMod has made to the weapon system is to look at the gunspecs. Stock weapons have about 80 lines in gunspec while the mod versions have 200-300 on average. That's A LOT of little odds and ends all contributing to better feel and gameplay.

Anyhow, I do feel your pain and have been working to improve responsiveness and feel where possible. Some may notice that guns like the pistols shoot a hair faster than before (from the mouse-click) due to changes in the way I am scripting the fire animations now.

When the time is right, I will be making a petition to Lee requesting the implementation of a laundry-list of AirMod features based on the availability of open-source code and abundance of quality media which supports it. Hopefully I will be able to rally some community support as I totally agree that right now the worse aspect of FPSC is ironically the shooting aspect.
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Nomad Soul
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Posted: 6th Apr 2009 19:16
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@Claws

Firstly thanks for taking the time to highlight the fact FPSC is an incredible game engine. Despite having been a user since Jan 2007 I still have to pinch myself to check I'm not dreaming when using it.

Fortunately gunplay is largely down to the user now we have recoil, iron sights and improved firing mechanics thanks to the mod squad. You can model and animate custom weapons in conjunction with this to achieve great results. I also find using the added gore feature when shooting people / creatures with airmod helps add some weight to the gameplay. The dynamic environmental blood effects are WOW.

I did manage to produce an FPSC bullet tracer effect which worked reasonably well but had 2 bugs. 1 you cannot make a weapon flak effect that does not explode which I really hope will be addressed in a mod so we can have an explode flag in the flak spec (hint hint) and 2 the engine will only track the first 3 or so bullet tracers for impact when using automatic weapons. Here is the link if you want to check it out

http://forum.thegamecreators.com/?m=forum_view&t=138997&b=24

Lee has already added the airmod shotgun reload to the official FPSC and we'll see more airmod features in the migration version.

At least we can do something about it and as you say everything else about FPSC is brilliant. I found using airmod with weapons changed the gameplay from FPSC to something more comparable to Call of Duty.
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Claws
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Posted: 6th Apr 2009 21:13
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I just downloaded Ply's mod (everyone keeps talking about it and how amazing the script commands are) and, to be honest... it's fu**ing amazing. That's what i'm talking about. The shooting gameplay is more fluid, everything flows instead of being grabbed at, if you guys understand what i'm talking. Lee should really implement the entire Ply's mod in the migration. I'm sure that Plystire wouldn't be sad by contributing heavily to the development.
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Bugsy
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Posted: 9th Apr 2009 07:45
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JUST IN! perfect ideas to make the "feel" of fpsc much better!

1. less enemy health, they should die in 2 to 3 shots from most anything

2. so much detail that it looks real

3. faster fire rate on weapons

4. no smoke decal

5. airmod for ironsights

6. change the soundset for enemies, they should shout cusswords and give orders to take cover

7.less ammo to pick up on guns: make ammo a concern

8.download or animate new death animations, I mean come on, what's with the whole falling flat on their backs every time thing?

9. faster moving

10. less gun accuracy for you and enemies

11. large enclosed spaces. they make you feel like you can go anywhere and still keep you in the level.

12. not so many different weapons, maybe 6 guns. so the player gets to be expirienced with the guns: maybe 2 rifles (1 m4 1 ak) an smg, a pistol (with unlimited ammo) a shotgun, and a sniper rifle

13. WAAAY more explosions!!!!

14. different gun sounds! the ones that they have sound really tinny and... well... non-gunnish

15. hard gameplay, you only have 100 health or you only have 1 life

16. constant lightmapping consistant with the mood of the level.

I got all these from screen shots and youtube videos of fps creator games.

I just made a quickie level in about 4 hrs and to tell you the truth it was the best i've ever made.

try THAT for shooting feel. god, I thought i was playing counter strike® in a THE CLUB® level. It was sublime.
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Claws
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Posted: 9th Apr 2009 08:28
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It would be good to see some new death animations. I tried making some in Fragmotion but, damn, they looked like sh*t.
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gorba flamingo
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Posted: 9th Apr 2009 08:32
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im trying to make some but i can never get them to work in fpsc, they keep freezing within the segments

[url=http://profile.mygamercard.net/gorbafletch]
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Claws
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Posted: 9th Apr 2009 08:38
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The major problem with the animations is the .X model. For example, we could use tools like Endorphin (http://www.naturalmotion.com/endorphin.htm) to apply a ragdoll to the model. Then, we would apply force to one part of the model, and it would fall like being shot. We would then be able to record that animation and simulate ragdolls, by recording more animations and having different animations on different models.

Unfortunately, the X model makes that very difficult, time-consuming and buggy. Almost impossible to someone without any experience in 3DS Max or rigging, like me.
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Butter fingers
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Posted: 9th Apr 2009 11:29
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The enemies still feel like retards though.

It's because they have no "sense" of the level. They don't recognise cover. they can't find a path from point A to point B. In fact the only way they navigate is by following the player path, or waypoints. Neither of which are suitable for a dynamic combat situation.
It doesn't really matter how nice the guns are, what it comes down to is that FPSCs combat will always be unsatisfying because your enemies will never challenge you. I mean sure you can throw 20 of them at the player, or give them all 400 health. But that's just brute force. Enemy AI will never interact with the player in a way that will challenge you to outsmart them.

I want robotic legs.
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Toasty Fresh
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Posted: 9th Apr 2009 12:32
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Okay Butters, you raise an excellent point but how come it's still mildly fun to jump into Garry's Mod, spawn a couple of Combine with AI disabled and admire the way you can shoot them in the head?
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Butter fingers
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Posted: 9th Apr 2009 13:38
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I don't use Gary's MOD but I'm guessing that it has ragdoll. That would be the start of it.

Also it's not really a fair comparison. I'm talking about making actual games, and how the character AI hinders that. You're talking about a quick bit of cathartic killing.

I want robotic legs.
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Claws
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Posted: 9th Apr 2009 13:43
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That's my point, Toasty Fresh. It's fun to do that even in HL1, which is an outdated engine.
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Toasty Fresh
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Posted: 9th Apr 2009 14:08
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Quote: "You're talking about a quick bit of cathartic killing."


That's probably just me
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General Jackson
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Posted: 9th Apr 2009 15:54
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I think the main problem is no recoil.
I Would love to have recoil, but i'm not using a mod because i always have problems when using one.
Also Ironsights and hand on all the stock guns would make it much more fun

It is well that war is so terrible or we should grow too fond of it- Robert E Lee
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Apple Slicer
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Posted: 9th Apr 2009 19:19
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Hmm, I dont know if anyone already posted but, I just played halo (again), and I noticed that enemies react to being shot clutching their stomach. Is this possible to do?
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wizard of id
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Posted: 9th Apr 2009 20:26
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Shooting feel of FPSC?

Well let me tell you this I am unhappy with certain aspects which could have been improved or expanded however.

I have stated before FPSC is still in it’s infancy like it or not it will take awhile before more content or improvements are made.

Ask you self why is half-life 1 better than an FPSC game .?
Is it because valve spends hundreds of dollars developing tools?
Is it because half-life 1 used a modified Quake engine where much of the work has been done for them.

Would games made with a quake engine be royalty free?

It’s unfair to compare FPSC to Games like half-life comparing games made with FPSC to games like half-life is comparing box wine to expensive bottled wine.

When comparing things compare it to some thing inline with what you have not what you want.

Comparing FPSC to the Quake engine or unreal engine you will find FPSC doesn’t make use plugins which both unreal or quake can make use of, each enemy in quake or unreal engine can have it’s own plugin with special commands specific to each enemy for example.

The animation also differ as developers working with the unreal or quake engine make specific model animation to suite their needs.

Don’t like the camera angle in this level change it quickly with a cscript plugin.

I could go on and on with this FPSC has default animation has default settings pretty much every thing is default. Why?

Because the developer chooses to do so the modelers who make the animation for models chooses to do so. Having special animations like swimming for example requires additional code to tell the engine that some thing is swimming.

Want advance AI where an enemy would duck behind a box or wall put his arm over and shoot at the player or runs and dives for cover. This is all possible it requires the animation to do so but also requires additional code to tell the engine the player needs to dive you could do special animation right now with current commands all you need is to is make your special animations.?

Want to make more realistic levels like half-life. How many meshes have you made to try and mimic a half-life level.

Trust me it can be done, to gain experience with meshes I did just that I tried recreating a counter strike level De-Dust 2 and it wasn’t even hard at all it can be done.

People just lacks the experience or imagination. Have you tried making a dynamic glass floor or a special mesh for a level to suite your needs.

If you haven’t why are you complaining as your not discussing Claws .Your indirectly moaning why FPSC doesn’t do this or that.

I recommend that you get those hands working and trying some thing new instead of doing the same old and complaining about your flaws in designing fpsc games

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Jingle Fett
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Posted: 9th Apr 2009 20:51 Edited at: 9th Apr 2009 20:52
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You raise good points WoID....I however have been doing just what you said we should be doing. Unfortunately though, I can't make use of mods given that I'm using X10.
That has it's perks of course; X10 has ragdoll plus all the other good stuff. But the "feel" is still pretty much the same and it will be the same no matter how many static or dynamic entities one makes or how good the animations are. Hopefully the migration version will address all this...

My main complaint is the fact that all this time, I've been fighting to do new stuff with the engine (which I have: relief mapping and 100% custom segments and relief mapping on segments in X10 among others). But in my opinion, all that time should have been spent working on my actual game. If it were easier to do this stuff out of the box, a lot of time could be saved...and more importantly, the game would be funner by default.

A picture says a thousand words.
--H.K.--
http://www.fpscx10-online.com/
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wizard of id
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Posted: 9th Apr 2009 22:54
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Well I don’t agree sadly.

FPSC being an extremely easy development tool to use no coding to get a working game. It doesn’t get easier than that. We shouldn’t be blaming the engine however FPSC does have nagging problems for example the AI not being responsive or as good as one would like. This can be fixed by Lee at some time in the future.

The point is Lee can fix and add new content all you like but there is still going to be people complaining about the engine. So we can effectively say that the users are some times at fault.

How do you go about making a game with FPSC?

Pretty much the same any professional game developer, how many people do this, how many people put pen to paper and draw level designs first before making the level.

How many create prefabs for the levels before making a level?.
Not many people do and the major part of that group complain about the engine.

This does raise some questions to regards if the engine or the FPSC package as a whole isn’t at fault who is.?

I would like to see a FPSC user who followed and created game design document did every thing a professional game developer would do to the letter and failed to either sell his game privately or publish the game??

Guys do talk about graphics that are not up to par with currently released games also about game features. The problem is however how open source or royalty free do you want FPSC.


Quote: "If it were easier to do this stuff out of the box, a lot of time could be saved...and more importantly, the game would be funner by default."
Game development is not a spoon feeding industry....game development is not suppose to be fun if you intent to make money blood sweat and tears is all that is going to get you where you want to be...

Blaming the engine....well have you tried to find a work around to a problem or problems.If you have how much extra info have you learned in the process that you wouldn't have in the first place if you haven't tried a work around?

Maybe we should start pointing those fingers at our selfs.

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Claws
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Posted: 10th Apr 2009 00:19 Edited at: 10th Apr 2009 00:24
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wizard of id, i'm not in any way comparing the engines. But FPS Creator is a tool, a product, and we, as customers, should be able to suggest and discuss current feature updates and new features. So, if i'm complaining or not, it's my right to do that and discuss with other customers. If we don't do that, TGC will keep updating the graphics engine and leaving us with a cute and bad-gameplay games.

Honestly, i'm tired of the very same: "FPS Creator is an indie tool, it doesn't compare to other engines". Well... hello? FPS Creator has a very good graphics engine, superior to id Tech 3, Half-Life and it's comparable to modern engine. It's physics are not so good, but better than the before mentioned games. The problem of FPS Creator is the lack of gameplay optimization. In the unmodified version of FPSC, there is no camera movement, gun recoil, accuracy or any of those basic FPS features. Please, don't tell me that gun recoil and camera movement are modern, because even Q3 mods have those features. Also, look at FPSC X10. It's better than very modern engine in graphics. But, again, terrible gameplay (although ragdolls are fun!)

Also, most of the features we are discussing here can be easily implemented (AI is not one of them, of course). And most of them, already have been implemented by ONE person (Ply's Mod). So, if one person can make the modifications that make the engine better, don't tell me that it's not comparable to commercial engines. With work, dedication, and most importantly, time, we can do anything that we want. I don't expect anyone to do those things for me, of course, but i'm just a little tired of hearing the same excuse for not having modern and SIMPLE features.

It's not about your level design skills, wizard of id, it's about what to do when the level design is done. It's about game design. And with certain source modifications, you can't get that done. For god's sake, we have to trick the engine in order to get simple features or fixes done, or just understand that it requires a source modification and don't do it at all, since TGC does not release the latest source.

If you don't have simple features, such as gun recoil, the game won't be fun at all. The game won't be fluid. It's doesn't matter if you have the skills to recreate dust2 on FPS Creator, the player won't care. You must immerse him in gameplay, which can be done with a few features. Simple ones.

I'm already working with Ply's Mod and the possibilities are endless. That's what i'm talking about. If one person did it, why can't TGC do it? Why?
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Bugsy
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Posted: 10th Apr 2009 02:45
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It shouldn't have that fizz sound when you get shot,
recoil isn't that important, the screen should shake when you fire though.
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gorba flamingo
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Posted: 10th Apr 2009 02:48
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@ bugsy
ALL the stuff you listed can be changed rather easily.

@ claws
although i didn't read your entire post id have to agree with you

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Bugsy
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Posted: 10th Apr 2009 02:54
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Yes I know, but it should Come with that
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gorba flamingo
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Posted: 10th Apr 2009 03:08 Edited at: 10th Apr 2009 03:08
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i disagree
most of the stuff you said can be done by changing numbers.
as for media, the only pro game ive seen use media they didn't make is far cry 1. its only there to start you off.
as for spaces and weapons, don't put more than 6 in your level, use better level design methods, etc.

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Robert F
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Posted: 10th Apr 2009 03:26
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I agree Highly with Butters on this one. In Fpsc the enemies are dull. They just come straight at you its so boring. I don't think recoil will do anything. Yes it will make it harder to shoot, but you can just take your time and kill an enemy so easily. All he is going to do it run in circles shooting at you. Its just to easy to me and I think that's what makes it dull.


shes a brick HOUSE!
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Claws
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Posted: 10th Apr 2009 03:29
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Bugsy, no, it shouldn't. It's our task, as game developers, to change what it's within our range to make our games better and, of course, characteristic. Changing sounds, animations and so on, it's our job.

The problem discussed here, although it's not exactly the very same subject i wanted in first place, is the things that are outside our range. Limitations that are imposed to our games, not because of hardware or software (i don't believe that gun recoil is so difficult to make that only commercial engines should have it), but simply the lack of the possibility of changing or adding stuff.
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Dar13
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Posted: 10th Apr 2009 04:09
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@claws:
FPSC was made by one person as well. Just an FYI.

...
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General Jackson
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Posted: 10th Apr 2009 05:03
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THERES THIS COOL FEATURE CALLED SCRIPTING.

in case robert f didnt know.
srry for this rude post but u can make baddude enemies if u can script well

It is well that war is so terrible or we should grow too fond of it- Robert E Lee
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Bugsy
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Posted: 10th Apr 2009 05:24
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sure, but If your not good at it and still want your games to be... *gulp* good... than theres my "How to Cheat in FPS Creator" guide lol

<blatant advertisement>(seriously, coming soon)
tells tou simple fixes that fpscreator can't do
(and game crration help)
</blatant advertisement>
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Robert F
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Posted: 10th Apr 2009 05:44 Edited at: 10th Apr 2009 05:45
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Quote: "srry for this rude post but u can make baddude enemies if u can script well"


Alright, if you think you are so good why don't you script recoil without opening the source up. Why your at it make a "baddude" hide behind a shelf and shoot his gun around the corner.

Whats up with all the negatives around here anymore...


shes a brick HOUSE!
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Bugsy
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Posted: 10th Apr 2009 06:30
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and an enemy accuracy adjuster and jump height adjuster for the main character.

don't tell us to script what you can't script yourself
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Robert F
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Posted: 10th Apr 2009 06:38
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Quote: "and an enemy accuracy adjuster and jump height adjuster for the main character.

don't tell us to script what you can't script yourself "


thank you.


shes a brick HOUSE!
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Bugsy
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Posted: 10th Apr 2009 07:15
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<double post>
someone could program in fpsc for smart ai

you can have if variables right?
(you should be able to have them)

make an ai script

basically

If the player is in the room, detect for static entities

If there are static entities, then go to the opposite side of that entity than the player is on

O-enemy
________
| |
| |
| entity |
|________|

O-player

now, Wait 5 seconds

if plr is visible (able to see by stepping out of cover) than go 1/2 grid space away from static entity to the left or right (whichever way the player is)

shoot for 3 seconds

repeat _ times and then

detect other static entities in room

if there are some, go to them and repeat the last processes

if not, stay behind this entity and keep popping out and firing

(oh, and crouch if necessary)

</double post>

I'm not saying I could do that, but maybe a team of people (good coders) could.

it would work for friendlies, just do all the same except detect and aim at enemies, if no enemies, go back to main.fpi. (home.fpi)

like?
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Bugsy
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Posted: 10th Apr 2009 07:21
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idea, get a team of scripters together

tell them to make a script where:

enemy detects static entities in room if youre there, goes to the opposite side of it than you are, waits 5 seconds, comes out and shoots you for 3 seconds, keep popping out 3 times then repeat the process on another static entity in the room.

do the same for friendlys but make them detect and shoot at enemies snd if no more are detected near, than go back to main script

you like

( i just wrote all of this, but it didn't post on my screen)
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Bugsy
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Posted: 10th Apr 2009 07:22
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holy crap nvm next page lol
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gorba flamingo
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Posted: 10th Apr 2009 07:41
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nice
i don't know if they can detect entitys, now matter what i script all my characters are bumping into each other lol

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Jingle Fett
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Posted: 10th Apr 2009 08:10 Edited at: 10th Apr 2009 08:23
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Quote: "Well I don’t agree sadly.

FPSC being an extremely easy development tool to use no coding to get a working game. It doesn’t get easier than that. We shouldn’t be blaming the engine however FPSC does have nagging problems for example the AI not being responsive or as good as one would like. This can be fixed by Lee at some time in the future.

The point is Lee can fix and add new content all you like but there is still going to be people complaining about the engine. So we can effectively say that the users are some times at fault.

How do you go about making a game with FPSC?

Pretty much the same any professional game developer, how many people do this, how many people put pen to paper and draw level designs first before making the level.

How many create prefabs for the levels before making a level?.
Not many people do and the major part of that group complain about the engine.

This does raise some questions to regards if the engine or the FPSC package as a whole isn’t at fault who is.?

I would like to see a FPSC user who followed and created game design document did every thing a professional game developer would do to the letter and failed to either sell his game privately or publish the game??

Guys do talk about graphics that are not up to par with currently released games also about game features. The problem is however how open source or royalty free do you want FPSC.


Quote: "If it were easier to do this stuff out of the box, a lot of time could be saved...and more importantly, the game would be funner by default."
Game development is not a spoon feeding industry....game development is not suppose to be fun if you intent to make money blood sweat and tears is all that is going to get you where you want to be...

Blaming the engine....well have you tried to find a work around to a problem or problems.If you have how much extra info have you learned in the process that you wouldn't have in the first place if you haven't tried a work around?

Maybe we should start pointing those fingers at our selfs."


It is true that people will always complain and that sometimes the user is at fault. But I can assure you with utmost sincerity that with me that is not the case (which is all I'm saying). I believe I have earned the right to complain as much as I want about X10 at least because I've pulled off stuff that others have not with X10. A lot of the other veteran X10 users aren't too happy about it either. And yes as a matter of fact I do look for work-arounds. In fact when I find a problem in X10 I search for a solution and if there is none then I make a work around. You probably haven't noticed but I have written a tutorial on the X10 forum on how to do relief mapping and getting it into X10, which was a nightmare to crack.

I know that you don't mean it that way, but I actually find this slightly insulting. For instance, you say how many people actually draw out their levels before making them, well I do. I've written not just one but 3 game designs (and have more in the works) and I'm working on two of them. I have certainly not been spoon-fed since buying X10. But seeing how other engines like Unity and C4 explain to everyone how to use their features, it makes me wonder why do WE have to fight to figure out work-arounds, why can't we simply be told how to do relief mapping, volumetric particles, etc.? The company behind just about every other engine doesn't keep that sort of knowledge secret as it seems to be the case with X10 at least. At some point one needs to stop saying the users should try harder because there are users that are trying and having trouble. Then we could spend more time actually working on the game rather than fighting with the engine.

Do you want to know what I've been doing since getting X10? I've been chugging out media, from textures to models to animated models to decals and dozens of segments and just about a bit of everything for the game I'm making. Right now I'm trying to figure out how to get weapons into X10. If it weren't for the fact that I and most other X10 users for that matter have been fighting tooth and nail to figure out how to get the "features" to work, I'd probably have a complete game by now. I have the models and animations and a lot of other stuff, but I first have to figure out HOW to get X10 to use it.

FPSC/X10 is easy to use it's true, but the hardcore features of X10(volumetric particles, relief mapping, etc.) have not been explained--it's basically been a handful of users trying to figure out how to do that stuff. And then when we finally do get it to work, it's buggy or only works partially. Those features are so obscure that nobody knows if they even work or not because nobody has been testing them out ever since X10 came out despite the fact that they're the selling points (at least for me). I'm not blaming Lee entirely because it's up to the users to find bugs and report them, but if the users don't even know HOW to test them out, it's not entirely our fault either. People do need to figure out ways on their own to make FPSC/X10 funner by default yet it's really hard to do so and so many users do in fact get discouraged. So yes, I am pointing the finger squarely at FPSC.

Sorry for going on a rant, I'm venting out some recent frustrations. It's just something that's been bothering me for some time to the point where I'm right on the edge of making the decision on whether I should ditch X10 for a better documented and polished engine (all my game assets shouldn't have too much difficulty switching engines given that I haven't actually fully completed even level 1 of my game. Like I said, all this time has been spent wrestling with X10). It bothers me because I would much rather stay with FPSC because X10 is actually good, but it's becoming increasingly difficult to do so and to tell myself why I should.

A picture says a thousand words.
--H.K.--
http://www.fpscx10-online.com/
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Claws
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Posted: 10th Apr 2009 11:02 Edited at: 10th Apr 2009 11:05
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Jingle Fett, that is absolutely correct. The problem here, and what we are somehow discussing, is the fact that... we shouldn't be working on work-arounds! TGC should be releasing fixes, or at least, providing the latest source so we can fix those for ourselves. We are not talking about an Open Source project or a single-person, we are talking about an commercial product, supported by a company.

Your point towards Unity, for example, Jingle Fett. It's exactly what i mean. There are many other indie-affordable engines around, and they do what they promise. They don't make the game creator waste time by waiting for bug-fixes (or "migrations) or making work-arounds. What drives me crazy is that people often say: "You can't compare FPSC to Unity/C4/etc.". Why not? Why can't we have a decent game engine, with a easy integrated game development environment? FPSC already has the amazing environment, so why can't we have the decent game engine? TGC is working on so many other projects and so many other good coders. Why Leadwerks Engine, for example, wasn't developed with DarkBASIC in mind? They had BlitzMax instead. Those incredible marketing mistakes affect the customer heavily.

I also, Jingle, considered switching engines. Unity seems the perfect choice for it's ease of use, but i also considered transforming my games into Source mods. Hammer is very easy to use and making Source mods is also very easy. Source SDK has the best documentation i have ever seen. I don't care if i can't sell the games, i just want to, at least, start making them and dedicating myself to a decent development environment. And that would be pretty cheap, $5.99 for HL2DM and the Source SDK.
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Toasty Fresh
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Posted: 10th Apr 2009 12:16
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Bugsy, detect for static entities, in other words detect for level geometry. How's that work? Static entities are part of the level geometry and thus can't be detected.
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Demon Air 3D
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Posted: 10th Apr 2009 13:57
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Quote: "It would be good to see some new death animations. I tried making some in Fragmotion but, damn, they looked like sh*t. "


Couldnt you try that character studio ? That has some pretty good death animations.
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wizard of id
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Posted: 10th Apr 2009 14:26 Edited at: 10th Apr 2009 14:26
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Bugsy and claws you are both idiots you just don’t know it yet.

Sadly there is a very good reason why FPSC is not progressing with AI or this or that and I have said it before. In order for FPSC to have better AI or better this or that requires extra code. This code is not going to fall from the sky as has to come from some where Dark Basic pro as such does have good AI commands however that is where it ends to have really great AI requires a plugin like for example DarkAI Lee might have added some of the DarkAI code but is not going to add all of it.

For the simple reason TGC will be running FPSC at a loss should they add the full DarkAI plugin. Same goes for the darklights that was added with version 1.04 adding all of the plugin to the engine would have again resulted in loss of income.

As good as Dark basic pro might be it requires some added plugins that improve the package as a whole. Each plugin costs money, for that reason alone we will never see
X9 improve on certain aspects.

Is that too difficult to understand.?

Quote: "
“Well... hello? FPS Creator has a very good graphics engine, superior to id Tech 3, Half-Life and it's comparable to modern engine” "
You are really brain-dead ?
Does FPSC have any of the following features if it does please point them out I would like to see how you can compare Id engine to FPSC or half-life for that matter.

Does FPSC make use of Directional lighting or spot lighting mapping ummhm no
Does FPSC make use of a proper particle system? Umhm no
Does FPSC have proper working dynamic shadows umhm no
Does the default engine support water planes like half-life would, which you can paint and apply a water textures to a plane. Umhm no
Does FPSC sport a scripting system that allows you to add your own commands umhm no

Again the list could go on and on.

FPSC superior lol just shows how little you do know about engines as a whole. Half-life 2 engine beat the Id engine hands down.

As for X10 well I don’t currently use it mostly because it doesn’t like my custom segments or is far too slow. I’m still disappointed I hope it does improve in future.


Gun recoil umhm basic features. ?? Since when?? You have to remember that each engine has it’s own set of basic features which not every other engine has.

Not every engine has recoil or exploding bodies for example.

Now because this great game called farcry makes you invisible when you hide in the shadows FPSC must have this BASIC feature because you can drive a car in farcry
FPSC must have the BASIC feature.

STOP asking for stuff that other games or engines do. Your making or trying to make FPSC substandard and your not doing a very good job at it.

FPSC does have the basics that every other engine has or you could say it has the needed features that makes it a First Person Shooter engine point period the end.

Extra features is a luxury to have ragdolls is a luxury gun recoil is a luxury to have super duper graphics that you as the developer are unable to use is a luxury.

It’s pointless to argue with some one who thinks FPSC is superior to the ID engine.

Pointless Assault video
http://w13.easy-share.com/1408971.html
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